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For Anonymous, because I’ve never started a poem with “Because.”
Because no system interests me unless it is flawed in ways that challenge my flaws
Because Ph.D.-ing allows one to avoid the crush of work's redundancy with the joy of analysis
Because most systems humble us and help us see how to seek our own senses of power
Because the creative and scientific production of ideas is not linear and is never ending
Because the best way to be rewarded is to make your own expectations informed and doable
Because all the trauma of a system amounts to what makes me rise above it
Because my acknowledgment rests mostly in the truth of knowing who I am
Because education nurtures and creates second chances toward self-reinvention
Because professors have more say in advancing change than in most power structures
Because I have learned to play the game of proving my worth with parallel life rules
Because I understand my hardships are worthwhile for the abstract rewards of the job
Because in school I am only limited by my own lack of questioning
Because knowledge is never ending and life is short, I do not waste time on self-pity
Because I know how my learning light is spent I promise to keep it bright
Because I am where students are given to me
Because I came from a career of meaningless but excessive financial reward
Because I can write this poem as professional act
Because leaving teaching for me is leaving loving,
I am the academy.
